This invention relates to a wire wheel and more particularly to an improved spoke pattern for such a wheel that facilitates manufacture on existing equipment and which will provide a high strength and light weight.
Recently, the advantages of forming wire wheels with a plurality of single spokes that are connected at their opposite ends to the rim at circumferentially spaced locations and at an intermediate portion to the hub have shown considerable popularity. One reason for this is that there is less likelihood of the spokes becoming loosened and, if properly designed, the wheel may be more conveniently and easily manufactured. Normally, the intermediate portion is formed with an angled part that interlocks with a corresponding opening of the hub so as to secure this intermediate portion to the hub. In one type of wheel, as disclosed in my pending Japanese Patent Application Serial No. 58-165218, the intermediate portion has a crank shape in side elevation. L-shaped retaining grooves are formed in one side of the hub so as to retain the individual spokes to the hub.
Although this construction has numerous advantages, the spoke pattern has a tendency to cause the individual spokes to interfere with each other unless their connections to the rim are located at a position slightly over the center line of the rim. Conventionally, wire wheels are formed so that the spokes at each side of the hub are connected to the rim either on the center line of the rim or on the same side of the center line as the cooperating hub portion. Thus, a wheel made in accordance with the construction shown in my aforenoted Japanese patent application does not lend itself to manufacture on conventional wire wheel making machines. Those machines are not designed so as to form the spoke attachment holes of the rim on the opposite side of the rim center line. Thus, considerable modification is required with existing machinery to manufacture rims for wheels of this type. Alternatively, it would be possible to avoid this problem through a reduction of the number of spokes, but this obviously will reduce the strength of the wheel.
It is, therefore, a principal object of this invention to provide a wire wheel arrangement that permits a strong wheel and yet can be manufactured on conventional rim making equipment.
It is another object of the invention to provide an improved wire wheel having single spokes that extend from the rim across the hub to another attachment point on the rim and which can be conveniently and inexpensively manufactured.